Sun Will Rise
by Brent-Ka
Summary: [Legend of Kay] Even after Shun's defeat, our heroic catboy continues to climb the path to immortality, this time faced with something much darker than just a few gorillas....


This is a story.

It is a piece of prose designed to entertain you as you connect words to one another and imagine characters fighting out a conflict in an established setting.  
This is also a very familiar story, one you may have heard before. It involves like most stories do, the conflict between Good and Evil. It features a hero on a epic journey to save something, and of course contains battle scenes to keep interest in itself. It's certainly nothing you haven't read before.  
But stories are derived from folk-tales passed down by the campfire...  
Folk-tales come from legend, a distorted view of history...  
And legend contains a kernel of truth. No matter how fantastic the story may seem...

"...And as life rots away, so too shall the rest of creation, until the stars fall from the heavens, the oceans give way to desert, and the growing shadow consumes all..." A dreary voice fluttered through the ancient temple.

"Kinda bleak isn't it?" Another one rang out.

It is a common misconception that villains prefer living in total darkness. This isn't necessarily true. They may serve it as a symbol, but it's ridiculous to stumble around in the dark all the time, especially living in something made of rock. Places such as these were not normally warm and friendly. Adjustments had to be made to this...safehouse in order to make it remotely habitable. Torches lined the wall, nearly every three inches. Where there wasn't a twisted statue, evil altar, or other fine furnishings, there were lanterns. One had to be careful where they would step, least they burn their feet right off.

It seemed to Zip to more like a walk-in oven. Come right in, and bake yourself to a crisp!

Wiping some sweat from her forehead, she repeated herself.

"I said, it's kinda bleak isn't it?"

Zip was to put as simply as possible, one of the very few rats who never embraced the scientific side of things unlike her alchemist brethren. It made her feel special to be dumb, like she was outside of a large, evil conspiracy. Unfortunately she had expressed this newfound individuality by joining another large, evil conspiracy. And she had yet to get the idea about talking about darkness like it was your best friend.

"It's imagery Miss Zip." The figure reciting the quote, growled at her. "Yes, it's bleak, it's the destruction of the known world!"

"Why do we wanna do that?" Zip raised an eyebrow.

"We don't!" The figure sighed. "I've explained this to you a thousand times before, we are not trying to conquer, destroy, harm, imprison, and/or ransom the world. Do you understand?"

"Not really." The rat shuffled uneasily. "What else is there?"

"Extermination." The figure spun around theatrically, red robes flowing. "That was a meditation on what will befall a certain people at a certain location..."

"Ya mean Yenching right?"

The figure stared open mouthed at her. "I was being ambiguous."

"What?" Zip stamped her footpaw down. "Look, can't you just say what ya mean instead of bein' all wordy?"

"No, it makes...it makes me seem more frightening..." The robes loomed down at her as the shadow stared.

"Seems to me like you'd have to understand something to be scared by it." The rat shook her head.

The figure did the same.

It's not that the figure was unable to be seen behind the cloaks, it's that there was no way of describing it adequately. After all, no one was quite sure what it was. They assumed it was male, and they assumed it was some sort of cat...otter...mouse...thing. Whatever it was, he most certainly had fur, and some sort of muzzle, and he didn't look a thing like any sort of primate.  
Strangely enough they never bothered asking him about anything. It was a kind of Thing You Did Not Do and no one wanted to be the one who did a Thing You Did Not Do, for the consequences could be dire...maybe. No one had ever tried before.  
At the most however, they had to call their own boss something, so they did once gather the courage to ask him his name. He had simply smiled and said:

"Ampersand."

Whether this was meant to be a horribly botched joke or not, it was the name that stuck. Ampersand himself had taken to it, signing all of his letters with an '&' proudly. Perhaps it really was his name, if it mattered at all.

"Right." Zip slammed one paw into a fist. "So we're gonna go in and blow 'em all up right? Ex-peel-osions and stuff like that?"

"Oh no, that's too clean." Ampersand smiled wickedly. "This will involve much more chaos, a few mountains of skulls, oceans of blood, much more fun believe me."

"And how we gonna do it?"

"Simple." Ampersand's robes swished as he turned around to walk down an adjacent hallway. "We start a war. That's usually how these things work isn't it?"

"Yeah but..." Zip ran after him. "Didn't Tak and the others try to pull that off with the apes just a while back? They didn't make it very far."

"No they didn't." The beast growled a bit.

It was an incredible tale. Apparently some local catboy had revolted against both Tak who had led the Rat Alchemists and Minister Shun who was in charge of the gorillas on Yenching. The kid had fought his way into a volcano, and completely smashed both groups there and then. It was a touching and inspiring tale that promised to be passed down into legend.

It was something, Ampersand had decided, that needed to be dealt with.

The leader coughed once and continued. "But as we all know, Tak was no fighter and Shun tried to use the Din Amplification to make himself invulnerable. Even with that kind of power, no one is invincible Miss Zip."

"But I thought we rescued Shun..." Zip bit her lip in confusion.

"Rescued?" Ampersand jeered off to the left, dragging the rat with him.

They both entered a small side room. Yet another altar was placed here, this one with a simple jar on it.  
Ampersand walked over to it picking the jar up and holding it in front of Zip's face. A small amount of thick green slime swished around a bit.

"I don't get it." Zip bit her lip.

"This my dear cheese-brained drone, IS Shun." The beast shook the jar a bit. "Say hello to the nice dim-witted rat lady Minister."

The slime stretched an inch of itself into an appendage, slowly waving back and forth in front of her.

"It's amazing isn't it?" Ampersand sighed putting the jar back down. "He's still somewhat sentient even after being reduced to jelly."

"Looks more like moldy gravy to me." Zip shrugged. "Why keep 'im around?"

"Because all things can be...reversed with a little effort Miss Zip." Ampersand smiled again. "And let's just say the Minister here is going to help us quite a bit..."

"Ohhh..you mean you're gonna use him in the attack."

He led her out of the room. "Yes dear, I am. In the meantime, why don't we educate you about foreshadowing? I'm sure you'll find it fascinating."

"I ain't much of an artist sir."

He patted her on the head. "We could all see that joke coming Miss..."

* * *

Kay ran through the circumstances once more. 

Okay, freed the island, completely obliterated most of the gorilla army, chased the alchemists back off the island and came home.

Strange things were happening. He had expected a hero's welcome, and was looking forward to an official honorary parade. What he didn't get it is why the gorillas were the ones throwing it.

"It's simple." They had said. "Shun was in revolt against the Empire. A Din Amplification device is blasphemy of the highest kind. Imperial forces are in your debt..." Blah, blah, blah...Kay had already figured most of it out. In reality boiled down to: "Crap! A revolutionary just single-handedly wiped out most of our army! Quick, let's twist the story around to fit our tastes before we lose the whole island!" So here he was sitting by the wellspring, in an attempt to avoid being honored.

It was hopeless. He knew sooner or later his ego would drag him out there.

"Hey, since when did you get all humble?" A voice came from behind him. Kay didn't even bother to turn around.

"Please Su Ling, you misunderstand the whole situation. I'm truly honored to be a pawn for an ideology I spent half a year trying to destroy, really."

"Okay, your sarcasm's still as healthy as ever. What level of sulkage are we looking at here? The small quiet "I'm crying on the inside" type or the complete angry psychotic breakdown?" A solid white cat-girl sat next to him on the well's outer wall.

"I'm thinking something along the lines of kicking Ou Bai in the butt and then running around screaming 'Ain't gonna be no pah-rade! Git 'em outta mah village!'"

"You did that an hour ago." Su Ling pointed out.

"Yeah, then they announced plans to build a statue in my likeness. Now don't get me wrong, I'd LIKE a statue in my likeness..."

"As long as it's forty feet tall and made out of solid gold..." Su Ling quipped.

"...Yes, now shut up and let me finish. It's the principle of thing, see? I don't exactly want to be the gorilla's new poster boy." Kay shook his head. "Just isn't fair is it?"

"Look, I'm not exactly a great fan of this whole mess myself." The catgirl laid out on the wall. "But for once in your miserable life think about other people."

"Yeah, like saving your butt from a kraken isn't thinking of other people."

"It's a little more complicated than that. You're a hero Kay. Whether you want to be or not. The gorillas are setting you up, but I'm afraid to say it, you've become a bit of a legend around the island. People aren't going to forget what you've done, even with all the twisting going on."

"What?" Kay looked at her a little confused.  
Su Ling sighed and kicked her feet against the wall a little. "You killed Shun. Shun the Invincible, Shun the Warmonger, Shun the If I Don't Get My Way I'll Feast On Your Head."

"Uh...I knew the guy was a slavedriver but since when was..."

"There it is. The islanders Don't see Shun as just a gorilla invader anymore, he's become something else. A figure of pure evil." The catgirl shivered. "Not that he wasn't mind you. But the point is pure embodiments of evil can only be slain by pure embodiments of good."

Kay blinked at her a little astounded. "Me. Pure embodiment of good?"

Su Ling went into thought for a second. It was a really dumb sounding idea. Kay was for lack of a better term, a smartass. A friendly, helpful kind of smartass, but all the same sarcasm was his life blood. Kay was under no illusions himself. His job as he saw it was to ridicule the weak into becoming strong, and if they stumbled along the way offer 'em a paw to help 'em back up and then comment on their uncordination.

The kid was no troublema--

The kid didn't really have a problem with the village at le--

The kid didn't totally hate a few peop-

Okay, the kid was an annoying know-it-all who had stuck his neck out too far on a couple of occasions, got a light nick and jerked back like a little kitten.  
Except, Su Ling thought If you get Kay REALLY mad. Then he'll just hack down half an army to come and argue with you.  
That wasn't exactly fair to Kay though, no one had been more surprised then Su Ling when he had showed up in the Forbidden City, ears low and apologized. It gave the panda mystics some weirdo idea that he was some sort of gallant knight. An idea which by now had spread throughout all of Yenching.

Master didn't mind a bit, despite the obvious lie. Free publicity and surely the only one who could surpass the hero was a greater hero himself, wasn't that true? Of course it had been hard to reason with the ancient fox while the poor sap was still half out of his mind from nettlemead.

"And there wash that t'ing." He had tried to get out interrupted by a few more drinks. "More Jade than you could get an a lifetime. And what'sh all that lead to hmmm? More nettlemead!" But even though he doused himself in that nasty old stuff from Li Tai's basement (Something, Su Ling had decided, was not nettlemead. It hadn't been nettlemead for about 40 years at this point.) He was still as dangerous as Kay, just not dangerous in a young way.

"...And I just don't think it's worth it." Kay snapped her out of the train of thought.

"Uh...yeah. Whatever, didn't hear you." The catgirl jumped off the wall. "Sorry to say it Kay, they actually sent me to come get you, annnd we're going. Now. Besides, Ming'll be disappointed if you don't show up for the parade."

"Ming still can't drink milk without spitting it up all over himself. And what, his brothers beat down on his sorry little head again? I should care?"

Su Ling refused to look at him, heading towards the village still. "You shouldn't...but you do..."

Sighing, Kay threw himself off the well and followed his friend.

* * *

Now left alone, no one noticed the wellwater that day. For the first time in years it had actual water in it. Not rainwater, but it's own natural spring. Murky, muddy and would probably kill you if you drank it, but it was it's own. And faintly the rock built around it began to hum...

* * *

"Pandas, Cats, Frogs, Rabbits, and Rats. The five principle races of Yenching." One of the alchemist rats was giving a lecture. "Years ago after the Imperial Age ended, Rats were banished from the island." He announced it with the utter most disdain in the world. "Their crime? Exactly what you're doing now. Use of Din for transmogrification." 

"Uh sir?" One of his students raised his hand. A rather fat gerbil raised his paw. "Isn't using a spiritual essence the exact opposite of as you put it 'The pure science of it all'?"

"Din." Smiled the rat. "Judgement. Severity. Gevur---" Stopping just short of what he was about to say, the teacher snapped back into reality. No evil speeches. Not yet.

"No, not all at all _Soldat _Miesche. Din is at once both an ideal, and an energy source. You are of course familiar with Songstone?"

* * *

More water slowly started to flood the well...the stones unaccustomed to being wet in the past century, were cleaned of their moss.

* * *

"Healing properties, they used it for." The teacher was visibly upset. "Yenching, that is. The Islanders claimed that by following their strict religious code the Songstone would provide them with healing. However Songstone is a natural substance infused with...some rather interesting qualities we should say.  
The ability to soak up literal energy for one. The stone itself cleaned the water and provided it with nutrients. The energy that would leak out would add more. Power to the body. This is where the 'healing' aspect came in. Immune systems were strengthened." 

"I have a question sir." Another Soldat raised their hand. "I heard that there is a link between The Way and the water. After all, when they abandoned it the springs dried up didn't they?"

"The Yenching religion." The rat nearly vomited up the words. "Was a useless and strict path that was abandoned out of pure common sense. We have discovered that there is no connection. It was simply the time for the springs to go dormant so to speak. The fact it co-incided with the loss of an outdated system of beliefs is coincidence. But we've strayed far out of the original question now haven't we? Din may mean Judgement, but I believe you all connect it with it's more modern meaning. Noise."

Now! Evil speech!

"Noise." The rat grinned again. "Beautiful unidentifiable, noise in which the world is consumed. The end to all monotonous songs and prayers, the all consuming chaos that is noise. Songstone? It gets it's name from the ultimate sin, organization of that Beautiful sound into something ugly. The energy stored up in that stone we now know as the base of all things. The first of the Alchemists named this Din. Others as time went on began to worship that energy and established to path to maximize it's uses and potentials and from this, we have the Din religion. They are in fact, one in the same."

The rat moved closer to the students. "Want to know the best part? Yenching's surface, cliffs, mountains and even pebbles all contain trances of Songstone. The entire island is one giant..."

* * *

"...Hideous noise!" Shen covered his ears and started to back away from the paradeground. "Kay, what IS that?" 

"I think it's the gorillas trying to play a tubasax. And don't ask me what that is." Kay joined his uncle in trying to retreat from the sound. "I'm more worried about that!"

He pointed a solitary claw pointed to a new poster hanging on the wall now showed a horrible likeness of Kay holding a tree branch. **If I can defeat an army with this, you can survive without weapons! Turn in your swords for safety!** The words under it ran in what was admittedly, very nice calligraphy.

"I mean, that's not even a catchy slogan, never mind the fact it never happened." Kay ripped the paper off tearing it into shreds.

"Really? I heard you beat Borax with it." Shen squinted at the remains

"No, I got _mauled _by Borax trying to hit him with a branch, remember? I cut the damn thing open with a good old fashioned axe!" Kay spat on the ground.

"Stop it." Shen smacked him upside the head. "Raised you better than that."

"Yes sir." Kay's ears drooped instinctively. Litterboxes. Saved the village, and he still couldn't spit or curse in public.

* * *

It was a sound the Master had only dreamed of. Stumbling out of the school, the old fox approached the well. Bending down slightly he pushed one ragged ear against the inner wall. No, it wasn't a sound, it was several sounds...all together. 

He couldn't hear the tubasax in the distance playing some type of military march, for that moment he was only concerned with one simple fact. No matter how silent it may have been...

The stones were singing again.

* * *

RETROSPECTIVE 

Short? Very short

* * *

Since this thing was hanging around on my hard drive for way too long, I thought I'd clean it up a bit and make one of those newfangled prefaces everyone's so hot about nowadays. Yes, there's an actual story coming with the traditional uber-long chapters, but I figured I'd post this to get myself started. 

As you can see here, we've got what might be the first Legend of Kay fic on the net. Go me. (Probably wrong though. Still kinda cool to think about it.) What I'm trying to do here is wrap up some loose ends now that we no longer have any hope for a sequel...(THANKS Jo-Wood!) Still, it shouldn't be too bad for all you who haven't played the game, and for the ten of you that have, expect some fun moments, but one that's VERY detached from the main storyline...mostly cause I can't write Chineese names for the life of me.

As for actual literary content, there's a special type of fusion of two cultures in the Cat Village I noticed. It's less "East meets West" and more "East meets rural Kentucky" Hopefully later chapters will provide a better setup of this.

There's also a very obvious nod to one of my absolute favorite passages in _The Screwtape Letters_. Yep, the noise thing. Read the book yourself, you'll enjoy it and be throughly creeped out at the same time.

Ah peas. 5 hours of sleep AND school and work tomorrow.

You're damned lucky ya'll got this much at all.


End file.
